EXECUTION OF SOME OF THE LANDSCAPE FEATURES - Continued
[Illustration: Fig. 69. A common form of edge for walk or drive.]
[Illustration: Fig. 70. A better form.]
These remarks concerning the curbings and hard edges of city streets may
also be applied to walks and drives in small grounds. Figure 69, for
example, shows the common method of treating the edge of a walk, by
making a sharp and sheer elevation. This edge needs constant trimming,
else it becomes unshapely; and this trimming tends to widen the walk.
For general purposes, a border, like that shown in Fig. 70, is better.
The sod rolls over until it meets the walk, and the lawn-mower is able
to keep it in condition. If it becomes more or less rough and irregular,
it is pounded down.
[Illustration: Fig. 71. Sod cutter.]
If it is thought necessary to trim the edges of walks and drives, then
one of the various kinds of sod-cutters that are sold by dealers may be
used for the purpose, or an old hoe may have its shank straightened and
the corners of the blade rounded off, as shown in Fig. 71, and this will
answer all purposes of the common sod-cutter; or, a sharp,
straight-edged spade may sometimes be used. The loose overhanging grass
on these edges is ordinarily cut by large shears made for the purpose.
Walks and drives should be laid in such direction that they will tend to
drain themselves; but if it is necessary to have gutters, these should
be deep and sharp at the bottom, for the water then draws together and
tends to keep the gutter clean. A shallow and rounded brick or cobble
gutter does not clean itself; it is very likely to fill with weeds, and
vehicles often drive in it. The best gutters and curbs are now made of
cement. Figure 72 shows a catch basin at the left of a walk or drive,
and the tile laid underneath for the purpose of carrying away the
surface water.
The materials.
[Illustration: Fig. 72. Draining the gutter and the drive.]
The best materials for the main walks are cement and stone flagging. In
many soils, however, there is enough binding material in the land to
make a good walk without the addition of any other material. Gravel,
cinders, ashes, and the like, are nearly always inadvisable, for they
are liable to be loose in dry weather and sticky in wet weather. In the
laying of cement it is important that the walk be well drained by a
layer of a foot or two of broken stone or brickbats, unless the walk is
on loose and leachy land or in a frostless country.
In back yards it is often best not to have any well-defined walk. A
ramble across the sod may be as good. For a back walk, over which
delivery men are to travel, one of the very best means is to sink a
foot-wide plank into the earth on a level with the surface of the sod;
and it is not necessary that the walk be perfectly straight. These walks
do not interfere with the work of the lawn-mower, and they take care of
themselves. When the plank rots, at the expiration of five to ten years,
the plank is taken up and another one dropped in its place. This
ordinarily makes the best kind of a walk alongside a rear border. (Plate
XI.) In gardens, nothing is better for a walk than tanbark.
[Illustration: Fig. 73. Planting alongside a walk.]
The sides of walks and drives may often be planted with shrubbery. It is
not necessary that they always have prim and definite borders. Figure 73
illustrates a bank of foliage which breaks up the hard line of a walk,
and serves also as a border for the growing of flowers and interesting
specimens. This walk is also characterized by the absence of high and
hard borders. Figure 68 illustrates this fact, and also shows how the
parking between the walk and the street may be effectively planted.
Making the borders.
The borders and groups of planting are laid out on the paper plan. There
are several ways of transferring them to the ground. Sometimes they are
not made until after the lawn is established, when the inexperienced
operator may more readily lay them out. Usually, however, the planting
and lawn-making proceed more or less simultaneously. After the shaping
of the ground has been completed, the areas are marked off by stakes, by
a limp rope laid on the surface, or by a mark made with a rake handle.
The margin once determined, the lawn may be seeded and rolled (Fig. 40),
and the planting allowed to proceed as it may; or the planting may all
be done inside the borders, and the seeding then be applied to the lawn.
If the main dimensions of the borders and beds are carefully measured
and marked by stakes, it is an easy matter to complete the outline by
making a mark with a stick or rakestale.
[Illustration: Fig. 74. A bowered pathway.]
[Illustration: Fig. 75. Objects for pity.]
The planting may be done in spring or fall,--in fall preferably if the
stock is ready (and of hardy species) and the land in perfect condition
of drainage; usually, however, things are not ready early enough in the
fall for any extended planting, and the work is commonly done as soon as
the ground settles in spring (see Chapter V). Head the bushes back. Dig
up the entire area. Spade up the ground, set the bushes thick, hoe them
at intervals, and then let them go. If you do not like the bare earth
between them, sow in the seeds of hardy annual flowers, like phlox,
petunia, alyssum, and pinks. Never set the bushes in holes dug in the
old sod (Fig. 75). The person who plants his shrubs in holes in the
sward does not seriously mean to make any foliage mass, and it is likely
that he does not know what relation the border mass has to artistic
planting. The illustration, Fig. 76, shows the office that a shrubbery
may perform in relation to a building; this particular building was
erected in an open field.
[Illustration: 76. A border group, limiting the space next the residence
and separating it from the fields and the clothes-yards.]
I have said to plant the bushes thick. This is for quick effect. It is
an easy matter to thin the plantation if it becomes too thick. All
common bushes may usually be planted as close as two to three feet apart
each way, especially if one gets many of them from the fields, so that
he does not have to buy them. If there are not sufficient of the
permanent bushes for thick planting, the spaces may be tilled
temporarily by cheaper or commoner bushes: but do not forget to remove
the fillers as rapidly as the others need the room.
Making the lawn.
The first thing to be done in the making of a lawn is to establish the
proper grade. This should be worked out with the greatest care, from the
fact that when a lawn is once made, its level and contour should never
be changed.
Preparing the ground.
The next important step is to prepare the ground deeply and thoroughly.
The permanence of the sod will depend very largely on the fertility and
preparation of the soil in the beginning. The soil should be deep and
porous, so that the roots will strike far into it, and be enabled
thereby to withstand droughts and cold winters. The best means of
deepening the soil, as explained in Chapter IV, is by tile-draining; but
it can also be accomplished to some extent by the use of the subsoil
plow and by trenching. Since the lawn cannot be refitted, however, the
subsoil is likely to fall back into a hard-pan in a few years if it has
been subsoiled or trenched, whereas a good tile-drain affords a
permanent amelioration of the under soil. Soils that are naturally loose
and porous may not need this extra attention. In fact, lands that are
very loose and sandy may require to be packed or cemented rather than
loosened. One of the best means of doing this is to fill them with
humus, so that the water will not leach through them rapidly. Nearly all
lands that are designed for lawns are greatly benefited by heavy
dressings of manure thoroughly worked into them in the beginning,
although it is possible to get the ground too rich on the surface at
first; it is not necessary that all the added plant-food be immediately
available.
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